Exactly 4 years ago I started this mission to save street dogs. I wrote about what it might look like here at the time. That is just 1460 days ago and I have to pinch myself at where we are now.
As anybody who follows knows however, the ambition for this mission is to shoot for the stars. There are so many street dogs suffering around the world that need help that it can sometimes feel daunting or hopeless but I can now see real progress and I wanted to outline what the next 365 days look like…
Just A Dream
I always laugh at how naive I was starting this. I genuinely thought I was saving the world by feeding 20 street dogs kibble from a bag on my moped here in Koh Samui. I’d come home every evening and think “wow I’ve fixed the problem”.
What I quickly realized was that I was opening a giant multi layered Pandora’s box of problems that was much bigger and more complicated than I could ever imagine. But from small seeds grow the greatest forests.
10,000 Dogs
In the first couple of weeks I remember helping the dogs and thinking to myself I needed to come up with a huge number. I just picked 10,000 out of thin air and wrote down that would be the mission…to help 10,000 dogs per month. It was actually the very first name of this newsletter…10,000 dogs. That was before I changed it to Happy Doggo.
It’s pretty hard to believe but we now help at least 10,000 dogs every single month via…
Alba’s Kitchen. We now cook fresh food for 1300 dogs per day from our kitchen
Partner Sterilizing program. We fund some wonderful organizations to sterilize over 8000 dogs per month. This number will continue to rise this year.
Happy Doggo Mobile Clinic. First one has launched with more to come this year. Each unit will sterilize 5000 dogs per year in rural Thailand.
Tina’s Hospital. Every single day we are treating dogs in need in our field hospital with many lives saved per week. This will only expand as the year goes on and the big hospital starts to come online.
Happy Doggo Content. This is the one I find hard to measure but with over 5 million followers across platforms in English and Thai I see lots of anecdotal of people adopting dogs, volunteering, sterilizing and generally helping dogs because of our content.
When you follow what we do you probably see one dog like Sienna having her life changed. That is obviously absolutely incredible for her but it’s important to remember there are 10,000 Sienna’s out there every single month being helped. It’s a very hard number to even get my own head around but I love it
Keeping Promises
I find this is a really good format because it’s really good at keeping us honest. What I mean is that I’ll usually share large ambitious ideas and plans and because they are in writing I feel compelled to get them done no matter how short on time or resources we are.
Most people (including myself) laughed and politely told me to get a grip when in the early days we mentioned helping 10,000 dogs per month but we’ve hit that target. Not easy and lots of tears and pain along the way but that impossible target is now a reality that happens every single month.
Despite so much being done there are areas where we are lagging. I am acutely aware of these and they are a key focus to drive forward…
Tina’s hospital is dragging. We have the permit, designs and infrastructure built. Shovels should be in the ground in the next 2 months.
Educational Programs. In our budgets for this year to do a major Thai educational program. We need to change hearts and minds.
Animal Cruelty Enforcement. We need to tackle the cruelty head on. It’s been tricky to get this sorted with local enforcement but this will happen in 2026.
In my own head I want everything done “Today” because I see how much the dogs suffer. Getting the permits, paperwork, logistics and hiring in place along with juggling funding and the day to day is not easy. But the dogs need all this to happen.
2026 - A Year Of operations
One common mistake that people make when following the dogs is giving me too much credit. Doing what we do now requires a team in Thailand and many people around the world supporting us (including you reading this!).
I always like to explain my vision here and while the last couple of years saw me do lots of rescues, writing 2 books, traveling to do dog walks, media coverage and crazy exploits like the Marathon, things will be different in 2026. My mind is fully on the operations of Happy Doggo. Helping more dogs at scale.
I feel like we have been given a mandate by people who support us. To help street dogs. I have to use that mandate to help as many dogs as I possibly can and this year that means getting into the trenches and getting the nuts and bolts working with our amazing team. That includes…
Hiring the very best people we can find. You can do this without an awesome team
Getting the best equipment resources and tools for the team
Ensuring we are one of the best run charities in the world.
Finding the funding to roll our the huge ambitions we have.
None of these are my passion but I always ask myself in the mirror each morning “Is this the best thing I can be doing to help the dogs today”. At the moment behind super focused on the nitty gritty is what it takes to answer yes to that question!
Atlas Proves We Can Move Mountains For Individual Dogs
If you follow us on social media you might have seen Atlas having his life saving operation. It truly was a small medical miracle that after 2 months of prep and under the careful watch of our medical team he made it through alive.
He is only one dog out of those 10,000 helped every month but I think he is very symbolic in that he was operated on at our field clinic on Happy Doggo Land. To make that happen some of the things needed were…
The talented team of vets and support staff
The advanced medical equipment and clinical setting
The electric, water and other utilities in the middle of the jungle
The hospital permits and local laws followed
The funding in place and reporting on charitable activities
The buildings and support staff for his post care recovery
Sometimes I feel like we are moving too slow but if you had told me 1460 days ago that we would be doing something like this I wouldn’t ever have imagined that.
There were probably about 50,000 tiny actions from signing contracts, hiring teams, buying trucks and even planting the flowers on Hope Avenue to get to where Atlas is today. Those same little steps help us treat the next dogs (there are 8 operations scheduled for tomorrow alone).
100,000 Dogs A Month?
I’m CEO of Happy Doggo and the best use of my time would be sitting behind a laptop or in meetings and calls all day. I do a lot more of that now but my heart is still with the dogs on the street. The reason I still feed them every morning and help to catch dogs and do rescues is not only to keep me close to the problem but because I am at my happiest with the dogs.
I am holding Mr Fox below who was the very first dog I ever sterilized at the local vets. If you had told me then that 3.5 years later in 2026 we would be funding over 100,000 sterilizations a year I would have laughed at you. Same with all the other wins we have had for the dogs.
It’s not a concrete goal but if we got to helping 10,000 dogs this fast it makes me think we can get to 100,000 dogs per month in the next few years. It might seem impossible to 10X something like that now but we have to keep shooting for the stars. The dog’s lives depend on it.
I hope this gives you a good picture of where I see things heading. I like to always try and be as upfront and honest about our wins and our struggles. Doing all this really isn’t easy but thanks to the support we have around the world we can do so much. Many of these dogs really are voiceless but we are starting to shift the tide in their favor.
Thanks as always for following along, it means the world to me.
Big Love,
Niall
P.S You can support the mission by just subscribing here on X or donating to Happy Doggo here.
